An Idea to fix an old archaic design of a loot system

[Ryios]

The entire gear with stats model is archaic.

What they should do (in my opinion) is give each piece of gear in the game it's own Experience Pool, E.g. make the gear like an actual entity, like the name of Ryuku's Uniform (Senketsu) in the anime Kill La Kill.

So in short, every piece of gear in the game would be vanity gear and would have a set of base stats (e.g. it's level 1 base stats). But not all gear you acquire would be level 1. It would be the level of w/e content you are doing. Except I think they should change CT and BCB gear to start at IL 70 to match darklight. Unless they keep the loot lockout (bleh) then they could have it start at il 90 in bcb like it already is.

Imagine this,

You get a piece of gear in Brayflonx Longstep, and eventually complete the set, (Battle Mage). So it simply exists at that level, il level 32. So the gear being level 32 means it has level 32 stats. But if you continue to wear it and get experience with it the gear levels up. Each time a piece of gear level's up it has an attribute window where you can choose what stats on it you want to level up.

Meaning, it would be theoretically possible to level battle mage up to IL90 and it be as good as af 1.5 or BCB gear, but might take a LONG time, since we cap at level 50, we'd be grinding it for a long long time to get it to IL 90.

But they should change the whole model and not release any gear past IL 70 and make us level it up to IL90. They could have a level cap on gear at Level 90 or w/e they want it to be.

This would make the concept of acquiring loot entirely based on cosmetic perferences to a player. You'd get the gear you think looks freaking awesome, meaning the hard gear to get, like Odin's stuff etc (from a time perspective) would actually be useful and not just cool looking.

On top of this they could make each set of gear teach you status effects and gear abilities that you can learn. So once you are 100% spirit bonded with it and it is level capped you can learn it's status effects and abilities and apply them to other pieces of gear.

They could make it so that the abilities and status effects from the different pieces of gear can be crossed (like cross class) to other gear sets. Where each gear set has 2-5 slots of abilities and status effects you can set.

-Status Effects
Ex1- Reduce Titan Plume DMG by 20%
Ex2- Increase Resistance to Fire Dmg by 20%
Ex2- Increase Spirit Bond Rate by 50%

-Abilities-
Ex1- Teleport To any Aetheryte for free, 30 min cooldown
Ex2- Increase gil from drops by 10%
etc
etc

With this, they could remove all the gear lockouts, because there is no real advantage from one piece of gear to another, except maybe the abilities and status effects you can learn from it. Then you would acquire the gear you like the best and level it up.

Now for spirit binding, they could add a story mode to actual gear sets. E.g. Your gear is alive, like in Kill La Kill. So you can actually have a conversation with your AF 1.5 Relic Set and it gives you back story. Maybe even sending you into an alternate reality where you help your gear battle it's evil side. And in doing so increase your bond with your gear.

I think it would be kind of funny to.

--(*Equips BLM Relic +1)
/engages a conversation with Relic +1
"I am the great and powerful blah, fear me"

--(*Equips MNK White TRash Level 1 weapon*)
/engages a conversation with it
"Hehe, I'm so scared, Don't take me into combat, I don't think I can handle it"

Then they could tie the repair system into this, so that if you gear reaches 0%, it actually dies and delevels (or your lose some of it's respect/spirit bind/love w/e).

Now, what good side effects would come from a system like this?

-People would run every dungeon, because their would be a need to collect all the gear sets for all the status effects and abilities for cross equiping.
-There would be no need for lockouts because gear would need to be progressed to be taken full advantage of
-There would be no need to create content that progressively gets harder to combat better gear, everything could stay at one level (just hard) E.g. they could have what they have now, and there would be il 55, 60, 70, 80, 90 content, no need to go higher than that, ever.
-Future expansions wouldn't make previous expansions obsolete
-The amount of variety and combinations would be insane
-Players would be playing more than 1 day a week even when they have every set of gear in the game
-... more as I think of them

[Wyyote]

So in short, every piece of gear in the game would be vanity gear and would have a set of base stats (e.g. it's level 1 base stats).

[Ryios]

I revised a little.... BUt sometimes blowing crap up to replace it with something better isn't a bad thing. People are just scared of a radical new idea they don't understand fully.

[Ryios]

The idea came kind of quick, but it would start at a certain level. E.g. say Darklight is IL 70, and then they change BCB and AF 1.5 to start at il 70. But the cap for any gear would be IL 90.

[Wyyote]

The idea came kind of quick, but it would start at a certain level. E.g. say Darklight is IL 70, and then they change BCB and AF 1.5 to start at il 70. But the cap for any gear would be IL 90.

This idea below came quick too. Sadly it ended the same way.

[Sunarie]

I actually like the system Chronicles of Spellborn had gear-wise. Stats weren't associated with the gear, all gear was purely cosmetic. What was important was the sigils you put in the gear. The sigils could be removed and reslotted into other pieces, in case you found different armor you liked better.

[Ryios]

I actually like the system Chronicles of Spellborn had gear-wise. Stats weren't associated with the gear, all gear was purely cosmetic. What was important was the sigils you put in the gear. The sigils could be removed and reslotted into other pieces, in case you found different armor you liked better.

That was a great game I looked forward to, but they had a Horrible publisher.

[Sunarie]

That was a great game I looked forward to, but they had a Horrible publisher.

Yeah, sad times. I closed beta tested it for a while but had to quit cause.. life happens. Never picked it back up several months after. So many interesting ideas and all in that game, but it never really garnered much publicity. Not too many I know of even really know of it

[Calyanare]

I actually like the system Chronicles of Spellborn had gear-wise. Stats weren't associated with the gear, all gear was purely cosmetic. What was important was the sigils you put in the gear. The sigils could be removed and reslotted into other pieces, in case you found different armor you liked better.

The Secret World had a similar system to this... Well, actually, all the gear was technically accessories: talisman, bracelet, necklace, etc. and the hat, chest, legs, boots, etc. were purely cosmetic and had no stats.

[Sunarie]

The Secret World had a similar system to this... Well, actually, all the gear was technically accessories: talisman, bracelet, necklace, etc. and the hat, chest, legs, boots, etc. were purely cosmetic and had no stats.

Yeah, I liked that one too. I don't know how many hours I spent in the stores. My mission was to buy all the clothes... and then I'd hit random things to equip and we'd run a dungeon... if we got through it okay then that was the "lucky" outfit, no matter how silly looking.